Shinigami Baseball
by sakana3
Summary: Shinigami intro to the beloved sport known as baseball
1. Chapter 1

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Shinigami Baseball

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Kurosaki Ichigo did not enjoy answering the door, because each time he answered the door, something bad happened. For example, there was that one time in fourth grade, when he opened the front door eagerly and was hit in the face by an over enthusiastic Tasuki, intent on splintering said door with her obnoxious knocking. More recently, he had been met by Urahara Kisuke carrying a dozen pounds of salt and pears, Abarai Renji in a tank with a semi-automatic machine gun, and Kenpachi Zaraki with half a GPS, to name a few.

Now, whenever the doorbell rang, or whenever someone knocked, Kurosaki Ichigo hid under his bed. There is no shame in that of course, no shame at all. Unless someone else was home. Then the annoying little voice some call a conscious and others the onset of schizophrenia would demand he grit his teeth and pull open the cursed door.

Such was the case one July morning. The doorbell sounded and his wonderful little sisters that could be less than wonderful most of the time glanced expectantly at him.

"Who is it?" grumbled a previously content Kurosaki Ichigo, or at least as content as anyone who knew the world as he knew it could all come crashing down at any moment could manage.

"Ah… Kurosaki-san. Nice to see you again," a very nervous Yamada Hanataro stammered.

"Oh. It's you," Ichigo relaxed. Yamada Hanataro was a nice guy. _He_ couldn't possibly drag him into the same kind of trouble Kenpachi and the dismembered GPS did. "What's up?"

"Ah… Kurosaki-san. I'm really, really sorry."

Ichigo frowned slightly and looked past the hapless seventh seat in time to see a grinning Ichimaru Gin and a slightly apologetic Ukitake Juushiro glancing back at him. In baseball uniforms. That was the last thing he registered as a dull crack sounded and the world spun round and round.

When he came to, the great substitute shinigami, who had mastered bankai in three days and became a vizard nearly unscathed, found himself in the middle of a baseball field.

"Wh-whatzis?" he muttered, still groggy.

"Ah… sorry Kurosaki-san," stammered out an embarrassed Hanataro. "You see… We were going to play baseball, but then we were short one person and well… Kurosaki-san doesn't live that far off and…"

He trailed off as Ichigo noted that he himself now wore a black baseball uniform and he shook his head quickly, not wanting to think how that had happened. "So… what now?" He really should be angrier. It was short of kidnapping, what they had done. They really could have asked. But being the understanding, sentimental kind of guy he was, he forgave them all. Well… maybe not Ichimaru Gin. If memory served correct, the man had not let him say two words to him before cracking him over the head with a bat. A metal bat. His head still rang loudly from that.

"Now we wait for Aizen-sama to quit arguing with the guy in the hat," grumbled Grimmjaw, popping up beside them in the same black uniform Ichigo wore.

"Arguing about what?"

"Well… Aizen-sama doesn't think it's fair that we have to have a player who took a crack on the head and hat guy thinks it's plenty fair. If you ask me, I think the creep hit you on the head purposely, whatever he claims."

"It was an accident. Really."

Ichigo glared at the new addition to their conversation, who was nonchalantly glancing off in the general direction the yelling was coming from.

"Um… I-Ichimaru-san," stammered Hanataro. "Ah… with all due respect, you sort of swung the bat at him. Really hard."

"A slip of the hand. One gets sick of carrying a metal bat."

"I… ah… I heard you wager with Ukitake-taicho how hard you could hit him."

"A joke, a jest. Nothing serious."

"Um… if you say so, Ichimaru-san."

Ichigo's pounding head cleared enough for one thought to pass through. He had to get out of there. And fast. His sanity may just depend on it. "Ah… look. Gin…er, I mean Ichimaru, look, I really need to get going. You know… um… I need to… water the… I need to water the prunes." The moment those words were out of his mouth, he wished he could take them straight back.

"Water. Prunes." Grimmjaw repeated the words slowly, individually, as if trying to conjure up a mental picture. "Water. Prunes."

Hanataro gave him the lost puppy look. "But Kurosaki-san… We really need another player."

He could have just ignored Hanataro. He could have gotten past Grimmjaw while the arrancar was still in his daze. And he secretly thought that if he ran really fast in the opposite direction while Ichimaru Gin was looking for his metal bat, he could get away. It was feasible; it was doable. But his nobler self hesitated. And a hand grabbed a tuft of his orange hair he so dearly treasured, though he would not admit it to save his life, and dragged him toward the dugout.

"R-Rukia!" he gasped. "What are you doing here?"

He thought he faintly heard Ichimaru mutter "well, that works too", but concentrated on the Kuchiki lady instead.

A glint entered Kuchiki Rukia's eye as she announced. "To 'play ball', Ichigo. It is my job to observe, experience, and report on the world of the living and what better way than to participate in a friendly game of 'baseball'?"

A dull thud sounded as Kurosaki's jaw hit the ground. "Do you see a 'friendly' person out there, Rukia?"

The addressed frowned slightly, but only adopted the cross stubborn look many women adopted when they thought they would not succeed in manipulating men to do as they wish.

"Look! Look! There's Aizen and Urahara snapping each other's heads off. There's got to be half the Espada here. And all the shinigami you have here are the ones with psychological complexes made just for them. And… oh no. Tell me that isn't Ganju."

"Only _three_ of the Espada are here," corrected Rukia crossly, not refuting anything else.

Ichigo opened his mouth to protest more, but was met by a sudden stampede his seven other "teammates" charged into the dugout, dodging baseballs that seemed more like oversized bullets pelted by the pitcher's mound.

"Let's play ball!" cheered Urahara far too cheerfully. They had obviously finished arguing.

Aizen Sosuke, the great Aizen Sosuke who would lead the arrancar to destroy the world an rebuild it to his own liking, stuck his head out of the dugout, narrowly missing a ball that burrowed itself five feet into solid wood beside him, and yelled, "Are you trying to kill us, Gin?"

"You said 'play ball'," yelled the pitcher back defensively.

"Key word is 'play', Ichimaru!" Tousen joined his idolized leader in yelling at his co-conspirator, though from the safety of the furthest reaches of the dugout. The path to least bloodshed, right? And it would be just fine if _his _blood wasn't shed.

"Not 'kill everyone in sight', you fox-faced freak!" joined in Abarai Renji.

The black team learned a very important lesson that day: The steel fences of dugouts do not stop 300 mph pitches.

"Well," said Ukitake merrily, always the peacekeeper. "Renji's face is… healing. So we need someone else to go first."

Those words sounded ominously like "we need someone else to feed to the half-starved hollows".

Somehow, he was not sure how, but somehow, Kurosaki Ichigo was pushed out of the dugout, with a flimsy helmet that he was sure would offer no protection whatsoever and a bat that he doubted could stand up to those bullets disguised as baseballs. Before he knew it, he was standing at home plate, the bat lifted hesitantly, standing between Yammy, who was wearing a catcher's mask that was far too small, and Ichimaru Gin, who was smirking more than usual. The ball left his hand and Kurosaki Ichigo knew, in the back of his mind, that it was going to be a long day indeed.


	2. Chapter 2

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Shinigami Baseball

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Kurosaki Ichigo was running down innumerable sand dunes composed entirely of white crystals, running as fast as his shunpo-enabled feet could and would carry him. At the edge of the horizon, just barely within his line of sight, he saw his target, the man who had brought upon the world a thousand reasons to suffer and wail in misery. Aizen Sosuke. And now, as he gripped the hilt of his zanpakuto that, according to the laws pertaining to gravity and the biology of human beings, no average high school student should possess the ability to swing with the ease of one Kurosaki Ichigo, he raised it high, ready to give the world reason to rejoice. The evil-intentioned traitor turned his head, his brown eyes widened in surprise as the steel came crashing down into his left shoulder. His lips parted, whether to scream or to whisper dying words to his murderer, Ichigo did not know. He leaned closer to the dying man, hoping to catch his last utterance and instead of something deep and philosophical that will keep the fansites talking for months to come, the soft, timid voice of Hanataro Yamada flew out, saying, "Kurosaki-san. Please wake up! Kurosaki-san."

Ichigo frowned. Since when had Aizen sounded like Hanataro… No matter. He raised his sword again, intent on finishing the deed and a good-sized apple hit him square in the head.

The great hero who shall run into a thousand battles and miraculously never die because he is the main character, blinked into the blue sky, painfully conscious of two fairly large lumps on his head. And a lot of arguing.

He sat up, slowly and looked around. Ah, yes. The baseball diamond and all the trouble it had wrought thus far.

"Kurosaki-san!" cried a joyful and relieved Hanataro Yamada. "You're awake. I thought you'll never wake up."

"I…" began the addressed.

"Oh, look! He's awake! Wonderful! See, no lasting damage done. And…er… no need for waving around your zanpakuto, Sosuke."

There it was. Ichigo groaned internally. Not _that_ voice again. The owner had already succeeded in knocking him unconscious once and if his suspicious prove correct, he was responsible this second time as well.

"You've already damaged one of our players enough!" came a needlessly loud voice from the same direction as the first, the pitcher's mound, Ichigo believed. "That's it. Urahara! We're switching Kurosaki for someone on your side!"

Switching. Kurosaki Ichigo giggled as his fogged brain deciphered the word. That meant he would be on another team. He laughed for no apparent reason. Another team. The other team. Urahara's team. The team not up to bat, so to say, the pitcher's team. Ichimaru's team…

His brain awoke in a jolt and he sat up with a vigor he did not know he possessed. "Nooooo!" he screamed for all the world to hear. "Don't put me on that psycho's team! Noooooo!"

The sound and image of the once dignified Kurosaki Ichigo was enough to freeze Aizen Sosuke in mid-sentence, apparently. The entirety of the two teams froze along with him, turned slowly to face the now sitting up Ichigo and in an united fashion, blinked twice.

The cause of the panic attack from Kurosaki was the first to recover, muttering to himself, "Wonderful. I've gone from creep to fox-face to psycho all in the course of one day."

Aizen Sosuke coughed, whether to disguise the sulking of his second-in-command, who he was beginning to regard in a whole new light (not unlike the way neighbors change their opinion of the former "friendliest guy in the world" who had just been revealed to be a psychotic serial killer) or to draw attention to himself, we can only guess. "I… ah… see that you have such strong opinions against Gin here… Very well. Seeing as how you are conscious, I suppose you still have your uses."

"Gee, um. Thanks," muttered Ichigo, himself embarrassed at his outburst. "So… um… let's play ball. Yeah."

He added the last half-heartedly, in hopes of returning the crowd to the same fervor as before, but only drawing even more attention.

Let us make a point here, before we proceed. It is this: Kurosaki Ichigo is not your average teenager. Of course you probably deduced this from the fact that he dresses up in clothes gone out of style a couple hundred years ago, wields a huge sword, and goes sprinting off into another dimension at any given moment. What we mean is that Kurosaki Ichigo is Cool. He does not stumble over words when encountered with girls, he does not wilt under the piercing glare of teachers, and he does not, most absolutely not, get stuck in an awkward moment. At least he didn't before. Now, with his reputation as Cool broken, he coughed, trying to find a way out, digging deep into his mind to find the rules of baseball.

Presently, one came to him and he stupidly voiced it right out. "So, that counts as a dead ball, right? I get a walk." He looked to the pitcher as he said it, who looked back at him, puzzled.

"A dead ball? A walk?" said pitcher repeated.

"You don't know what that is?" Ichigo frowned.

"Ah… no. Urahara just told me to throw the ball as fast and as hard as I can at the batter."

Every eye turned to find the "innocuous, lowly, good-looking" merchant with the same expression one wears when encountering one's mortal enemy, a look that contains so much rage it is deceptively congenial. Said merchant chuckled nervously, muttered something about doing anything to win, then ran for his life, with all but the still puzzled pitcher and newly revived batter chasing after him, bats and zanpakuto in hand.

"How very interesting," commented Ichimaru slowly, eyeing the droll procession.

"Ah, ahem. Yes. Of course. Now then, a dead ball is when the ball hits the batter and a walk means I get to go to first base," explained Ichigo. "See, now, Gin… I mean… Ichimaru… er… how should I address you? Anyway, you, you're supposed to aim over the home plate. Not at the batter. And not with the intent to destroy everything in…"

He trailed off, realizing that he was explaining _baseball_ to the second-in-command of his sworn enemy, who had probably been gutting people since before he was born and would no doubt do one Kurosaki Ichigo the same courtesy if the fancy took him. He coughed and took a step back just as the other muttered, "Incoming."

That step back perhaps saved his life, for a moment after the word was put forth, Urahara, followed by a little more than a dozen shinigami and arrancar who were all foaming at the mouth, came running through the gap between the two.

"Pardon, excuse me, whoops," rang out from the ever courteous merchant, though these became screams worthy of the movie Saw and all its numerous sequels when the first of the pursuers caught up to him.

"Very violent, don't you think?" yelled Ichigo over the gory sounds, hands over his ears, though in hindsight, it might have been better to witness the R-rated pounding Urahara was taking than converse with a sadistic murderer about said pounding.

"Did you say something?" Ichimaru yelled back, his own hands over his ears.

"Peru may come sing?" shouted a very confused Ichigo.

"Doomsday sum ring?" shouted an equally confused Ichimaru.

"I can't hear you!"

"You're going to have to shout louder. I can't hear over… oh! Look! Now they're burying him alive!"

Ichigo frowned, sure that his mortal enemy's second-in-command had just commented on something, but unable to decipher it through the screams, shouts of fury, and occasional gory splat. An idea popped suddenly into his immature teenage brain. If Ichimaru Gin, the second-in-command of his sworn enemy and a man whose guts he hated, could not hear a word he said… He grinned to himself, opened his mouth, and sealed his death warrant, screaming, "Hey! You fox-faced psycho! Over here! Are you (the text has been deleted as the profanities that flew from Kurosaki's mouth are too horrid to record) and (likewise, this text has also been deleted) and (this text has been struck from existence, plunged into the deepest blazing inferno in existence and left there to wither to ashes, which will be flung to the four corners of the Universe)."

He grinned to himself at his cleverness, only noting seconds later that the violence had subsided long before, with a disheveled Urahara hung from a tree by his ankles and all that had ever took breath staring at him in shock. He chuckled nervously and glanced at the addressed, who was tapping his fingers on the hilt of his zanpakuto.

"Ah… hi, Gin…I mean, Ichimaru-san, er –sama, or I mean, beg pardon, most high majesty…" squeaked Kurosaki, his height positively diminishing.

"Could you, ah, repeat that last part," inquired Ichimaru politely as he unsheathed his zanpakuto.

The crowd turned away and dutifully covered the ears of their younger members, so as to shield them from the intensely violent and gory sounds coming from the pitcher's mound, trying to ignore the splatters of red that constantly assailed them and the high pitched screams that sounded much like a butchered pig.

They grinned at each other shakily, reminding themselves it was all part of life as a shinigami/arrancar.


End file.
